Live from Toshiba's CES press conference
10:00 – a.m. – We're here, the HD DVD players and TVs under covers are on stage.
10:07 – Ladies and gentlemen please take your seats
10:10 – Director of Corporate Communications just took the stage – Next up: Jodi Sally to "address" their HD DVD business, but first, President & CEO Mr. Ozaka
10:12 – Great success for Regza LCDs and HD DVD, strong Q4 sales for HD DVD – Really, it says so on the slide.
10:13 – "Very surprised by Warner announcement about HD DVD...etc", basically the same as the press release issued earlier.
10:15 – Jodi Sally is on stage "It's been a tough day for me (laughs)".
10:16 – "Only HD DVD has deliver on its commitments to the market, bringing advanced functionality and affordability"
"We've been declared dead before...unit sales in Q4 were the best to date. Nearly 1 million dedicated HD DVD players are in the market" "HD DVD has always put the interests of consumers ahead of companies"
10:18 – "Thanks for your continued support", a slide of all the awards HD DVD has gotten in the past year — and that's it.
10:20 – On to the HDTVs – a slide of Regza's awards from the past year.
10:21 – The death of the RPTV, as presented by bar graph. "Flat panel TV is 81% of the TV business and growing fast"
10:22 – Stats showing consumers choosing LCD over plasma even at higher prices. Guess people don't care about little things like contrast ratio.
10:24 – Targeting 10% market share in LCD 32-inch and above in 2008.
10:25 – 1. Black is the new black, 2. 1080p is the new 720p. 3. 120Hz is the new 1080p. 4. No value over $3k — The HDTV facts according to Toshiba
10:27 – All new models with DynaLight – adjustable from 7 – 10 times the panel's contrast level, up from 5x last year
10:28 – AV500 series – 19 – 42-inch LCDs, all shipping in spring. Pixel Pure fourth-gen system provides 16,384 levels of gradation with 10 bit displays
10:31 – New Video Bypass circutiry on all Regza models improves by 48ms response time on 120hz models – no gaming mode necessary. Bezels slimmed to 1.5-inch at the most. 1080p available as small as 32-inch in the RV530 series. Replaces HL167
10:34 – Motion Vector 120Hz. New feature – 5:5 film pulldown mode. split screen 60/120Hz processing for comparison.
10:34 – New XV540 flagship model 42-, 46-, 52 -inch models get new color processing, 108% of NTSC color. Hits in spring
10:35 – XF550 Cinema Series in 42- 46- and 52-inch models with DynaLight Super Contrast for superior black levels.
10:35 moving to fall/spring product introductions
10:37 – Talking about the power of Cell chip to do super SD2HD upconversion. Claims it makes SD look like HD. ( Somehow we doubt that)
10:42 – Annnnd we're out, no Q&A (We had some interesting questions to ask about HD DVD)